Page 131 of In Shadows We Dance

Fragments of Control

WREN

My phone buzzesfor the hundredth time this morning. Monty’s name flashes on the screen, followed by another text.

Monty: Where the hell are you? Third day skipping?

I don’t answer. My focus stays on the desk, where the two black roses and the ruined ballet shoes sit, preserved between sheets of glass like evidence from a crime scene. The roses’ edges are brittle, their color fading, curling, their scent long gone. The shoes, worn and torn, look as though they’ve danced through fire.

They’re all I have left of her.

The hollowness inside me spreads deeper every time I look at them. They’re pieces of her. A message, maybe. Or maybe I’m just fooling myself, twisting fragments of reality into a map that doesn’t exist. My fingers touch the glass, and I can almost see her there.

Dancing. Running.Disappearing out of reach.

Another text arrives. This one from Nico.

Nico: Dude, answer your fucking phone. Principal is asking questions.

I let the screen go dark. They don’t understand. Theycan’tunderstand.

A notification pings from the security system, and I turn to the monitors. Another sensor tripped in the woods. I scan the feeds. Nothing. No movement I can pinpoint. Between the federal agents swarming the woods and the shadows playing tricks with my cameras, I don’t know what is real anymore.

They’re not even subtle about it—footsteps beyond theproperty line, the faint glare of headlights that disappear the second I turn a camera toward them. They want me to know they’re watching, a silent warning tightening around my throat like a noose.

Every second I can’t see her, can’treachher, the tension coils tighter inside me.

The phone vibrates again.

Monty: If you don’t answer your fucking phone, we’re coming over.

Thatmakes me respond.

Me: Don’t. Federal surveillance. Stay away.

Monty: What the actual fuck?

I set the phone down and turn to the security panel mounted on the wall. My fingers move fast, hitting the code to lock down the gates. A soft mechanical hum confirms the gates are sealed, their iron bars cutting Monty and Nico off from the property.

I can’t explain it to them, not when I can barely untangle it in my own head. The agents out there aren’t just observing me; they’re circling, waiting for someone to stumble into their trap. Waiting for me to falter.For herto slip. I won’t let anyone walk into this mess, least of all my friends.

I turn back to the desk. The map sprawled across its surface is covered in ink—red lines tracing possible routes, scattered notes marking probabilities. North and west. The clues I have to believe she left behind.

But it’s not enough.

Ileana is a ghost now. She’s disappeared without a trace, just like they wanted … yet not, at the same time. No phone. No cards. No social media. No way for me to follow. Everything that makes her invisible to the world now makes her impossible for meto find.

My chest constricts, panic creeping in like a slow poison.

What if I’m wrong? What if I can’t track her?

My phone buzzes again.

Nico: At least tell us if you're alive.

Me: Busy. Stay away from the property.

Photographs litter the desk. Ileana dancing, running through the woods, asleep in my bed.

---